In pleading guilty, Wong, doing business as Lucky Company, admitted that he imported the abalone using commercial invoices that falsely identified the seller. The 43 importations Wong referred to occurred between February 2012, and July 2015, and involved a total of approximately 67,500 kilograms (148,500 pounds) of abalone. The invoices falsely stated the seller to be Exportadora De Mariscos De Mexico, SA de CV, at the false address of Calle Cubilete No 110, Fracc Capistrano, Tijuana, Mexico. As part of his plea, Wong agreed to forfeit $500,000 of proceeds of the illegal importation.

Abalone is a highly regulated fishery in Mexico. The laws of Mexico require that commercial invoices have sufficient information on them to allow tracking of the seafood to its lawful origin. An invoice lacking the true name and address of the vendor does not permit authorities on either side of the border to trace the origin of the product.

SAN DIEGO – A Tucson firm and two executives were arraigned in federal court May 26, 2017, on charges related to the illegal trafficking of $17 million worth of sea cucumbers from 2010-2012, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.

Blessings, Inc. of Tucson, its owner David Mayorquin, and Ramon Torres Mayorquin of San Diego were charged in a 26-count indictment with conspiracy, illegal trafficking in wildlife, importation contrary to law, false labeling and criminal forfeiture.

According to the indictment, defendant David Mayorquin, on behalf of Blessings, contacted suppliers of sea cucumbers in Mexico and agreed to purchase approximately $13 million worth of sea cucumbers, knowing that it had been illegally harvested in excess of permit limits, or without a proper license or permit, or out of season.

It was a further alleged that defendant Ramon Mayorquin received the shipments of sea cucumbers from the Yucatan to Tijuana, Mexico, and created false invoices to be submitted to U.S. Customs officials, knowing that the sea cucumbers had been illegally harvested, sold and transported, and lacked the proper paperwork required under Mexican law.

United States officials returned hoards of looted pre-Columbian artifacts (the objects themselves were from pre-Columbian times, but the looting job was post-Columbian) to Mexico this week. Included in the pile were items stolen from Mexican museum and objects taken in a looting-for-hire operation that targeted the Copper Canyon area. Below is the Immigration and Customs Enforcement release on the return:

EL PASO, Texas —U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement returned more than 4,000 pieces of stolen and looted cultural artifacts to the government of Mexico at a repatriation ceremony Oct. 15 at the Consulate of Mexico in El Paso, Texas.

The items were recovered in 11 separate investigations by special agents of ICE’s Homeland Security Investigations in Douglas, Ariz.; San Diego, Calif.; Chicago; Kalispell, Mont.; Alpine, Del Rio and Laredo, Texas; and one in Mexico City, in coordination with Mexican law enforcement agencies.

Among the archeological pieces returned to the people of Mexico are the following: five pre-Columbian statues, more than 4,000 pre-Columbian artifacts and 26 pieces of pre-Columbian pottery that date back more than 1,500 years. The return of this cultural property is the culmination of HSI undercover and sting operations with assistance from U.S. Customs and Border Protection, who interdicted many of these items at various ports of entry.

The collection of items returned includes:

Pre-Columbian metates, manos;

Multiple pre-Columbian statues;

An Aztec-era whistle;

Copper hatchets;

Pre-Columbian pottery;

A clay anthropomorphic statue;

A Chinesco Nayarit figurine; and

About 4,000 other archeological objects of assorted pre-Columbian artifacts.

Of the objects returned Oct. 25, three pre-Columbian statues were discovered during a CBP agricultural inspection of an individual who arrived on a bus at the Lincoln-Juarez Bridge Port of Entry. Another pre-Columbian undeclared clay statue was discovered hidden in the luggage area of a person’s vehicle entering the Del Rio (Texas) Port of Entry from Mexico. A fifth pre-Columbian statuette was also discovered along with an Aztec Eagle whistle concealed in the dashboard of another person’s vehicle entering the Del Rio Port of Entry. An undeclared pre-Columbian metate – grinding stone – was discovered in the vehicle of two individuals entering the United States from Mexico at Naco, Ariz. Also discovered at the Naco Port of Entry, was another metate with four manos – a stone used as the upper millstone for grinding foods –lying in the bed of a person’s truck, who said he stayed at his grandfather’s ranch during his visit to Mexico and was bringing back clothes and tools.

Two copper hatchet artifacts were discovered in cargo received at San Diego International Airport via Sweden. While screening express mail at the Chicago Port of Entry, a CBP officer intercepted a parcel for inspection containing a falsely declared clay anthropomorphic statue dating to the early first millennium A.D. CBP officers, assigned to the Chicago Port of Entry, also discovered a shipment containing a Chinesco Nayarit figurine exported from the United States.

In a June 2009 undercover operation, HSI special agents in Alpine recovered from an individual in Fort Stockton, Texas, 200 Mexican artifacts alleged to have been smuggled into the United States after being stolen in July 2008 from a private collection and museum in Cuatro Cienegas, Coahuila, Mexico. Later in November 2009, Texas Department of Public Safety troopers assisting HSI special agents stopped the same individual in a vehicle for a traffic violation and observed artifacts in the vehicle that the driver admitted were undeclared when he entered the United States at the Presidio (Texas) Port of Entry.

After HSI special agents seized the artifacts, they opened a second investigation associated with the seizure of more than 4,000 artifacts including arrowheads, bows, rabbit sticks, axes, spears, tomahawks, statuettes, sandals and beads, all relating to the same conspiracy.

HSI special agents seized 26 pieces of pottery greater than 1,500 years-old following an investigation in Kalispell, Mont., regarding a consignor who had paid members of the Tarahumara tribe to loot artifacts from burial caves in the Copper Canyon area of Chihuahua, Mexico, so he could consign them in a local art gallery.

HSI’s investigation determined that the objects were removed from Mexico in violation of Mexican law and brought into the United States in violation of U.S. laws and regulations. A U.S.-Mexico treaty of cooperation regarding the recovery and return of stolen archaeological, historical and cultural properties, which was negotiated by the U.S. Department of State and enacted in 1970, restricts the importation of pre-Columbian artifacts and colonial-era religious objects into the United States without proper export documents.